This New Year’s Eve marked the spreading of solidarity noise demonstrations outside of jails, prisons and other places of confinement. In North America there seems to have been over a dozen cities and even more the world over. Participating cities/countries included, Bloomington (IN), Oklahoma City, Chicago, Minneapolis, Oakland, Baltimore, New York City, Atlanta, Pensacola, Pittsburgh, Portland, Seattle, Vancouver, Phoenix, New Orleans, Columbus, Richmond (VA), Italy, Greece, Argentina, Barcelona, Zaandam (Holland), Helsinki,Berlin, Bremen, Koln, Stuttgart (the last four in Germany), Brixton, Bristol, London (the last three in England), Sydney, and a caravan through southern Ontario. Let’s make this the year to end all years!
About St. Louis’:
This New Year’s Eve we gathered at Kiener Plaza, former home of Occupy St. Louis, to march to the Justice Center. The 20-30 of us held banners that read “(A) WAR ON PRISON SOCIETY (A)”, “RIP A.L. SMITH AND ALL VICTIMS OF THE STATE”, and “RIP SCOTT PERRY MURDERED BY THE STATE”, and chanted “What goes up, must come down, burn the prisons to the ground!” and “Our passion for freedom is stronger than their prisons!”
We stayed in the front of the jail long enough to get across our hatred of it and receive the endorsement of someone who had just been released, and then marched around back. Unsatisfied, we decided to march a few blocks more to a yuppie stretch of cafes, restaurants and nightclubs, blocking traffic and chanting “Avenge Anthony Smith” and “On the count of three say fuck the police. 1-2-3 ‘Fuck the police!” The mood was celebratory and for a moment a few youths joined us chanting “Fuck the Police!”
Police presence was scarce to non-existent.
Some of the things on our minds that night: the police murder of Anthony Smith and another police shooting the week before; the continuous harassment, beatings and killings dished out by the police throughout the year and those that refuse to simply take it; the spreading of prison noise demos as a New Year’s tradition (what other ones can we create regionally, nationally, internationally?) and also as compliments and ways to communicate during unrest in prisons – the California and Georgia strikes, etc.; the five state murders over the past few years of inmates in the Justice Center, including Scott Perry; and the eviction of the occupation.
Avenge Anthony Smith.
Avenge Scott Perry
Free Kevin Johnson and all who fight back.
– some anarchists
